Wednesday, October 01, 2008

New Gito Baloi album!

I got a message on Facebook today announcing a new GitoBaloi album, called Beyond, produced posthumously using recording made before he died in 2004. (See my previous post about GitoBaloihere).

Folks in the USA can buy the album from CDBabyhere (you can also listen to the tracks online), or you can order from Kalahari in South Africa (see below).

Here's the full message*, from the album's producer Dave Reynolds:

There's a brand new GitoBaloi album out called Beyond.

Using bass and vocal recordings which Gito did before he died in 2004, the music was developed in studio by some of the musicians that had worked closely with him on various different projects in his life: Steve Newman, Paul Hanmer, Ian Herman, Dave Reynolds, McCoy Mrubata, Moses Khumalo, Pedro Pinto Da Silver (of 340ml), TlaleMakhene, Tony Cox, Frank Paco, Nibs Van Der Spuy, Deepak Ram, RuiSoeiro (of 340ml), Bernice Boikanyo, Paulo Chibanga (of 340ml), ThuliMdlalose, Eliot Short, VusiMaseko and Graeme Sacks.

Here is a write-up by Daniel Brown from Radio France International - there's also a 20 min audio interview which I did - also features some words by Gito.

The album is available from Kalahari . 100% of the proceeds of sales go to the GitoBaloi Memorial Trust (since all costs have been covered by donations).

The Radio France International interview also touches on a collaboration project called Grassroots which features Gito as well as Louis Mhlanga, Concord Nkabinde, Jeff Maluleke, Chris Tokalon, SiyaMakuzeni and others. It was nominated for three South African Music Awards and had hit songs on Kaya FM and MunghanaLonene FM [South African radio stations].

The Grassroots album African Moods is also available from Kalahari, and check out the Facebook group called "friends of gitobaloi" which will also be the name of the collective of musicians who will be performing tracks from Beyond.

Look out for this - Oppikoppi etc.and funky video coming soon on YouTube too. So get down and pass this on (for Gito and his family, and because it's a great album to have in your collection) ....